A joint police and military team in the Ashanti Region is on the hunt for unidentified men who allegedly planted explosives in two separate gas cylinders at the residence of the Deputy Ashanti Regional Minister Andy Osei Okrah and in a national security installation next to the Minister's residence.

According to the Regional Minister Alexander Ackon who issued a statement, Thursday, one of the canisters could have exploded within two to three minutes if the detonator had been ignited.

The minister claimed experts were able to diffuse the explosives before it could cause damage.

Giving a seemingly disjointed account of what happened, the minister claimed the men who sat on a motorbike rode into the house which had the wife of a caretaker of the house sitting under a tree outside.

The men had the cylinders with the detonators and were later confronted by a policeman in the house.

Just when the policeman was asking questions, another man came from the house and dropped another box of cylinders with the detonators and fled.

The house, according to the Minister, is a thoroughfare and made it possible for the bike riders to ride in, drop the explosives and escape.

He said the regional security council has begun an investigation into the matter but no arrests have yet been made.

A hoax?

The feisty investigations by the security personnel notwithstanding, some Ghanaians are treating the story of the explosives with cynicism.

On Peace Fm's Kokrokoo, Wednesday, Editor in Chief of the New Crusading Guide Newspaper Abdul Malik Kweku Baako Jnr suspected the story was a hoax by persons he would not name.

He said the Regional Minister's incoherent narration of what happened on the day largely exposes the lack of seriousness of the story.

To ground his cynicism, he chronicled instances where some government officials faked their own assassination attempts, as well as waging a media campaign on a purported attempt to stage a coup on the internet.

Mr Baako read a letter purported to be a threat of a coup by some unidentified men who alerted the then IGP Peter Nanfuri about their intention to stage a coup in the country.

According to him, a government appointee, Rojo Mettle Nunoo used that empty letter as basis to chide the NPP of attempting to stage a coup to then president Rawlings from power.

Whilst he was convinced that the Ashanti bomb threat was a hoax, he would not say what the motives were.